by Steve Eshom on January 17, 2011
Wow, was it ever wet this weekend! I knew there would be rain but I guess I didn’t realize how soaking it would be. Between Baring and Merritt the rain came down harder than a normal Western Washington rain. Instead of small drops they were large and copious. As usual the worst weather makes for the most interesting photos so despite the rain I feel I was able to capture some very nice images.
At Merritt there is plenty of snow on the ground. The warm temperatures and rain have caused the snow to fall from the trees leaving them to look no different than on a chilly spring day. Douglas Fir trees always look great with their branches laden with the latest blast of snow. Alas this year that situation was just not to be.
Just down the track a few miles we ran into a gentleman clearing the parking lot for the ski trail parking. The layers in the snow show just how many times this area has been coated but the slushy wheel tracks in the lot show the true condition of it. That poor snow blower was having a tough time spraying saturated snow.
On Thursday night, my travelling partners Robert Scott and Scott Lothes drove down to the Miller River bridge west of Skykomish to attempt a photo of an eastbound freight climbing up from Baring. That evening the Miller river was already over its banks with overflow crossing the Old Cascade highway in a dip. Just like the desert southwest washes this dip allows the excess flow of the river to cross the road without destroying the it. I’m sure this is a much more cost effective means to handle the occasional flood on such a lightly used road. By Friday evening the road was officially closed though many locals and law enforcement forded the deluge in the dip anyway. Of course the early 20th century era railroad bridge was not affected by the high water.
by Steve Eshom on August 17, 2010
Last weekend was the annual “Hot Rail” railfan gathering and yep, it was hot. Wenatchee in the mid-90s, the Stevens Pass in in mid-80s, and the west side near 100. It is August though so that should be expected.
There is a nice thread going on railroadforums that is showing some of the awesome work the group did over the three days. I encourage you to check it out!
Towards the end of a very warm day, the westbound Z CHCSSE2 glides down Trinidad hill to the Columbia River crossing at Rock Island.
by Steve Eshom on February 3, 2010
Back from the snow? Well I wouldn’t say I was in the snow that much on Stevens Pass because west of Scenic (west portal of the Cascade tunnel) there was none. East of the tunnel there was snow down to Peshastin. Yikes! I hope we have cool summer because there really isn’t anything to keep us wet through the summer.
As it ends up I took one photograph with the trees covered in snow. On Saturday morning an eastbound Z train just happened to be across the pass while it was still cool enough out that the overnight precipitation had fallen as snow and stuck to the trees. Thanks to the light amount of snow I was able to photograph the train at west Berne. Normally this location is so snowed in that getting a photo here would require snow shoes.
The next photograph of an empty grain train shows just what the entire west side of the pass looked like…green. Normally there’s a foot or less at Foss River in January but not this year!
This year Robert, Aaron and spent more time between Leavenworth and the Chumstick tunnel than ever before. There are a few photo locations in the Chumstick and the longer we poke around in there the more we’d like to see. The photo below is a coal car mid-train in an east bound coal empty crossing the Chumstick Highway where the tracks head into the Chumstick tunnel. Definitely there are a few locations here that I’ll visit again.
I’ve posted a few more of my photos on railroadforums.com in a thread containing many photos from the group of us at Tracks in the Snow. There are some great photos in this from many of the group so I encourage everyone to hope over there and take a peek. Ken and Greg caught a couple I particularly like. Hopefully there will be snow next year.
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